Experience social technology the corporate way.

Written on Wednesday, 28 August 2013 by Chris Vo

In my previous blog I decided not to share this case scenario
as I thought it may not be relevant to the activity task required so I’ll post
what I would've included in a new post.

Qantas does have an endless history for social media PR
disasters affecting their reputation and share holds as a result. Back in 2010,
Qantas flew into a PR twitter storm when a user from the highly populated
social media network, reportedly sparked a disaster with these simple words:

“Sorry have bed news 9.15 am waktu jakarta,qantas airlane
from jakarta to sgpr have a accident before landing in batam...hiksss..”

The tweet generated nearly 200
million users who were made to believe that the plane had exploded. But, a
relief for the Twitter followers when mainstream media pushed a tweet from a
passenger on-board who confirmed the safety of those on the aircraft.

There was still one question which
remained. Where was Qantas to provide reassurance of the chaos on twitter?
Qantas played no role in keeping curious followers informed during or after the
events that unfolded. Surely I would like to be kept up to date with a disaster as it is happening.

So what are the lessons learned
from this explosive social media outbreak?

Qantas had failed to recognize how
crucial it is to keep the media updated of events to ensure that loved ones
aren't left with a cliff-hanger. As a result, an inaccurate piece of
information clouded the Twitter network and Qantas’ reputation received a lash
for not clearing these misconceptions within a timely manner.